Island Forty-Four Electric Guitar Review

It wasn’t long ago that Harmony guitars
of the ’50s and ’60s were considered ill-suited
to serious music making. But such
guitarists as the Black Keys’ Dan Auerbach
and Marc Ribot have made amazing, signature
sounds on these (once) affordable axes.
And in their wake, players, collectors, and
even guitar makers have reexamined the
merits of these guitars while driving prices
on the vintage market ever higher.

Nic Delisle, the luthier behind Island
Instrument Manufacture, uses Harmony,
Silvertone, and other department-store
guitars as points of departure for his own
idiosyncratic designs that sound and look
like few other guitars on the market—an
impressive feat for a builder only in his mid
20s. But while Harmony guitars were mass-produced
in a large factory, Delisle makes
each Island instrument by hand in a shop
in Montreal’s Mile-End—a neighborhood
known worldwide for its robust independent
music scene.

One of Island’s latest offerings, the Forty-Four, is a handsome reinterpretation of the
small-bodied, single-pickup Harmony H44
that Marc Ribot used to great effect. And as
our review guitar, which is fresh off Delisle’s
workbench, makes clear, that once lowly
design, relegated for decades to the dustiest
junk shop corners, is an excellent platform
for design improvements.

Smart Design Extrapolation
With its single cutaway and narrow waist,
the Forty-Four shares the same silhouette
as its inspiration. But there are key distinctions
between the Island and the Harmony
original. The Forty-Four has a bolt-on
neck instead of the H44’s neck-through
construction and employs a string-through-body
configuration inspired by the Fender
Telecaster. And by scrapping dot position
markers and a pickguard, Delisle has given
the Island a more minimalist look.

A conscientious builder, Delisle prefers
to source domestic or reclaimed timbers.
And when he uses an exotic hardwood, he
donates a percentage of the proceeds to
a reforestation initiative in Nicaragua. In
this case, the one-piece body is cut from
sinker cedro espino recovered from the
Panama Canal. The neck is carved from quarter-sawn poplar, while the fretboard,
headstock overlay, and bridge base are all
fashioned from black locust that’s given an
ebonized and distressed treatment befitting
a vintage-inspired guitar.

Though the design has an almost
elemental and basic feel, the Forty-Four is a
looker. Gold hardware often looks chintzy,
but the guitar is so minimal elsewhere that
the gold open-back Gotoh 510 tuners,
EVO fretwire, and strap buttons all bring
out warmth in the woods rather than beam
like garish afterthoughts. The brass compensated
saddle, which was custom made
by luthier Mark Kett, is elegantly sculptural,
and the gold-foil pickup, custom crafted
by Vintage Vibe Guitars’ Pete Biltoft, calls
to mind a tiny mid-century radio.

The Forty-Four’s ivoroid tuner buttons,
truss rod cover, and control knobs offer a
nice complement to the brown and gold
of the woods and hardware. And in a nod
to the time-honored bar band tradition of
using the red rubber washers from Grolsch
beer bottles as strap locks, Delise includes
them as standard equipment here. Another
nice touch is the hangtag, handwritten on a
rectangle originating from a cardboard box
of St-Ambroise Pale Ale—another detail
affirming Delisle’s commitment to using
domestic and recycled materials (and his
taste for good brew, apparently).

The Forty-Four feels solidly built, thanks
in part to the five bolts connecting its neck
and body. Craftsmanship on the guitar is very
good. The oil finish on the neck and body
feels smooth and fast. The frets are all well
seated and cleanly polished, although just a
tad sharp at the edge of the fretboard. Upon
super-close inspection, I found small imperfections
in spots—a dimple in the body’s
wood near the pickup, for instance. But then
again, this is a handmade instrument and not
the product of CNC machinery, so inconsequential
little anomalies suit the personal,
bespoke, arts-and-crafts feel of the instrument.

With its 45-millimeter (about 1.77") nut
and 56-millimeter (2.2") saddle spacing, the
Forty-Four has a wide neck for an electric
guitar. But it’s more than manageable for
a guitarist accustomed to tighter quarters,
thanks to its comfortable neck profile, which
is shallow, but not skimpy. The guitar left
Island’s shop with sleek, low action, and it is
equally comfortable to play in all its registers.
Although it shipped with strings that are
heavier than normal for an electric—a .012–.052 La Bella set with a wound third string—it isn’t difficult to bend the strings, thanks to
the fretboard’s rather flat 16" radius.

Ratings

Pros:
Terrific sound and playability. An affordable, handmade boutique guitar with a vibe all its own.

Soaring and Dirty
Plugged into a Fender Deluxe, the Forty-Four shines. The lone pickup, which is
designed exclusively for Island, is patterned
to some extent on the “Hershey Bar”
pickup found on the original Harmony.
I didn’t have a vintage H44 at hand for
sound comparison, but the new pickup
does have a decidedly old-school flavor. It
is gorgeously clean, with abundant clarity
and detail, and is very sensitive to nuances
in playing. The tone knob has a wide and
useful sweep. Rolled back completely, the
pickup sounds much like a jazz box, and
at the other end of the spectrum it has a
sweetly cutting timbre.

Given the wide string spacing, it was
only natural to try some fingerpicking on
the Forty-Four, and when subjected to some
basic Travis picking in the lower quarters, it
returns the favor with a rich snap and notes
that ring brilliantly. Like old Harmonies,
the guitar has a rude side, too. And when
you dig in with a plectrum for a traditional
blues solo, it responds with an aggressive
but not strident bark.

It seemed natural to channel Marc Ribot
on the Forty-Four, so I played a transcription
of the unaccompanied “St. James
Infirmary,” on which Ribot tunes down his
Harmony by two whole-steps. A lot of guitars
would sound muddy tuned this low, but
the Forty-Four retained its vibrant character.

The Verdict
In the Forty-Four, Delisle pays a respectful
tribute to a classic bargain guitar by taking
the best parts of that template in smart new
directions. It’s the perfect instrument for
electric fingerpicking, and its lone pickup
delivers a wide range of tones that will work
for everything from bebop to swamp rock.
With a base price of $1,900, this handmade
boutique guitar is also less expensive than
many factory-made instruments, and while
not cheap, it’s not bad for a guitar that’s
more than a little unique in terms of sound
and style.

Adam Perlmutter is a freelance writer, transcriber, and engraver living in Culver City, California. He contributes to Premier Guitar, Acoustic Guitar, Guitar Aficionado, and other music magazines, and has written a number of instructional books, including Color Your Chords (Cherry Lane) and Jim Hall: Signature Licks (Hal Leonard).

Related Products

User Reviews And Comments

Your gear experience and opinions are valuable—and powerful. To maximize the usefulness of your review to fellow players, be as thorough as possible in describing your experiences and insights for every ratings category (Tones, Playability, Ease of Use, etc.). Regardless of your overall opinion on a piece of gear, please be respectful and courteous to companies and other reviewers.

Stay Connected

Sign up for our email newsletters!

Get the PG Apps

On PremierGuitar.com, "Sponsored Content" refers to articles, videos, or audio recordings that are produced or curated by an advertiser but that Premier Guitar is happy to share alongside our own editorial content due to the Sponsored Content’s educational, musical, or entertainment value. Sponsored Content is clearly labeled everywhere it appears, and Premier Guitar's editorial department has no involvement in its creation.